Billyh - how have you been ?
In a situation where Google tracks users/developers - using it’s knowledge derived from it’s search business and other stuff (potentially) - and leveraging that for developer account signups.
And where Google can ban a user (perhaps for bad behavior by the developer - ok, thus far).
But what if Google has no policy in place for the rehabilitation of developers ? There have been some developers who have posted about “what should we do if we want to go legit” and they want to “apologize to Google” and so on …
If there is no option for rehabilitation - there is going to remain a need for people to get multiple accounts or whatever … Google is playing judge/jury/executioner here. By banning a user once, and then busying themselvs with investigating developers’ IP history, and whatever else (Eclipse signatures or whatever) in order to continue to track developers who may have behaved badly before - isn’t Google ASKING for developers to seek other recourse to circumvent what could very well be an oversight by Google (i.e. banning developers who can then never be unbanned ?) - JUST because Google cannot afford to put real humans behind this task, or the task is (so far) not sufficiently optimizable to be done fairly (in the human sense of the word) by machines (as being done now by Google).
Currently Google will ban the brother of a developer from creating an account - just because the IP address is the same or some such thing.
Obviously this is absurd behavior - and there is going to be blowback from the developer who does not see rhyme or reason in this Google policy (i.e. not just the misbehaving developer - but even the sensible developer who has invested time into learning Android, having left their job or whatever, and not finding sufficient guidance by Google or warning in some cases that would have gotten the policies clear in people’s minds).
Witness the fiasco with the ad networks - Google could very well have a running “this ad network is acceptable, this is not” list issued by a PR office every week - so developers know to stay away from some developers and not others (not even discussing the “fairness” of this procedure). But you realize this would still be “better” than what we have now.
What Google is doing is that by NOT stating any policy beforehand regarding one or the other type of ad network - they ESCAPE censure or challenge, yet retain the ability to arbitrarily crush developers (and the ad networks who spent the time to build up their systems). If Google WERE to be issuing advisories every week - they would be under burden of challenge by the ad networks for “fairness” or “equal access” or such issues. By not going there - and keeping everything under wraps, Google is seeking to escape scrutiny by feigning ignorance of the wider market (so it cannot be accused of going after one ad network or other).
But with such power, it is reasonable to expect some responsibility - a responsibility to warn developers/ad networks well in advance BEFORE they commit themselves to things - it is not like these developers are avoiding asking Google - they are always wanting to ask Google “is this ad network ok with you” (again we are not examining how horrid even this turn of events would be if every ad networks wants Google approval - yet, the reality is even worse than that - as Google acts like it is being “fair” by feigning an air of ignorance about what’s going on in the ecosystem.
Google needs to keep a running list of acceptable/unacceptable ad networks - and should then ALSO be prepared for challenge from those ad networks (in court etc.) - as THAT is the full responsibility which comes from enforcing things. As it stands now Google by feigning ignorance (and then coming out with a WHACK on ad networks/developers) essentially KILLS their competition before they ever get a chance to mount a challenge. So this behavior by Google is a STRATEGIC move - as it denies potential challengers in court from mounting adequate defence - as Google seeks to keep a poker face. The question to ask is - should the “manager” of the Android ecosystem be engaging in such practices i.e. “poker face” etc. ??
